Table Of Content© 2015 Rosetta Thurman
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TABLE OF CONTENTS
Introduction
Chapter 1: Get Focused
Chapter 2: Get Clarity. Find Your Sweet Spot and
Identify Your Ideal Clients
Chapter 3: Get Paid
Chapter 4: Get Online
Chapter 5: Get Out There
Ready to Launch Your Business?
About the Author
INTRODUCTION
Welcome to Launch Your Business! I’m Rosetta Thurman, and I’m excited to be
with you through the process of getting your business off the ground.
Your business idea may be something you’ve been thinking about for a long time
but have never fleshed out, or you may be relaunching something that you
started a while back but never really brought to fruition. You may be starting
from scratch, or you may already have a business that’s doing all right but not
growing as quickly as you’d like. Whether you need to launch, relaunch, or grow
your business, you’re in the right place! Wherever you fall in any of those
categories, I welcome you.
Launching a business is a big decision. It will change your life. I wrote this book
because I want to help you become CEO of your life and use your business to
craft your ideal life.
A few years ago, I was where you may be now. By all accounts, I had a “good”
job. I had a good salary, health insurance, employer contributions to my
retirement plan, five weeks of paid time off, money for professional
development, flexible hours, the ability to work from home, and even my very
own parking spot. I was successful by most measures, but something was
missing. I was haunted by a question attributed to Robert H. Schuller:
What would you do if you knew you could not fail?
My answer: work for myself. Write for a living. Travel. Write more.
I had wanted to write a book for a few years, but I could never seem to find the
time to do it. Although I liked my job, I couldn’t wait to get home each night and
work on my own projects. I didn’t want to work myself to death and wait until
my 60s to finally start living the life I wanted. My life was good, but it wasn’t
enough. I wanted to it be great.
So in 2007, I began blogging about leadership issues in my industry. People
started reading my blog and inviting me to speak at events and run workshops.
That’s how I got my start as a consultant.
In 2008, I announced the opening of Thurman Consulting, even though I was
still working a full-time job and had no intentions of leaving anytime soon. I did
that to let people know that I was available for speaking and consulting, which
became my side hustle—something I did on the side in addition to working my
full-time job. By the end of that first year, I had earned $10,000 by speaking and
consulting. That was enough for me to see the potential for actually making a
living this way.
I kept building my business, and two years later I quit my job to work for myself
full-time. In my first year of working for myself, I earned the same amount of
money I had been making at my day job. That’s when I knew that I could build a
successful business doing what I love.
Over time, my business evolved from nonprofit consulting to helping women
achieve big goals and beautiful dreams for their lives. My business, Happy Black
Woman, reaches thousands of women every month through weekly articles,
books, courses, workshops, social events, retreats, and coaching programs. It’s
been an amazing journey to be able to do what I love and get paid for it! Best of
all, it’s on my own terms.
That’s my goal for you, too. I’ve written this book to help you make that happen.
I want to commend you for being here. You’re embarking on a journey, and this
is just the beginning of something that’s going to be really amazing for you.
Starting a business can be intimidating, but I’ll walk you through the steps you’ll
need to take to start and build a successful business. I’ll show you how to take
your idea, start earning money from it as quickly as possible, and keep building
on it until it’s ready to support the life of your dreams. The best time to start is
right now, so let’s dive in.
I invite you to visit: www.LaunchYourBusinessBook.com for free resources and
training to live life on your own terms
To your success,
Rosetta Thurman
Creator of www.HappyBlackWoman.com
CHAPTER 1: GET FOCUSED
In this chapter, we’ll talk about how to transform your mindset and make time
for your business. These steps will be crucial to making your business a success.
The first thing we’ll talk about is the mindset shift that you’ll need to make as an
entrepreneur. That’s really important to your success in your business. We’ll also
talk about setting an income goal that will help you focus your efforts on the
most important revenue-generating activities in your business. Identifying your
goal will help you plan out everything you’ll need to do to get there.
We’ll also cover three powerful strategies to help you remove any negative
energy that may be holding you back from achieving success in your business. A
successful business isn’t just tactics, strategies, and the right to-do list. For many
people, the number-one thing holding them back from building a successful
business is negative energy. We’ll talk about how to deal with that and all the
energy-sapping things in our lives that have no business being there.
Finally, we’ll talk about how you can create a consistent weekly schedule. This
is important. Even if you have a demanding full-time job, kids, and a husband at
home, you need to make time for your business. Every entrepreneur needs to
create some type of schedule and stick to it. I’ll also give you some time-
management tips to help you make progress in your business goals every single
day.
I know how hard it is to build a business when you have a full-time job and a life
full of responsibilities. My business started as a side hustle, and for most people
that’s the best way to start. That way, you have time to build your business while
you still have the security of a full-time job. I’ll show you how to find the time
and make it work.
All of these pieces come from my own experiences in building my business for
two years on the side while I still had a full-time job, as well as the work that
I’ve done with clients over the past few years to help them to build their own
businesses. We start with getting focused, because this is one of the biggest
challenges to making progress. Once you have that down, everything else flows.
Shifting Your Mindset
The first mindset shift you’ll need to make is to begin viewing your endeavor not
as a hobby, but as a business. If your business is something you love, chances are
it started as a hobby for you. But if you want to build a successful business, you
need to treat your business more seriously: as a business, not a hobby.
It starts with realizing that you can have it all—but not all at the same time.
There are some choices you’ll have to make in support of your business. You’re
not going to be able to have the same lifestyle that you’ve had. You’re not going
to be able to do all the things that you’ve been doing.
That’s not always a bad thing. It just means that you have to tell some people no.
In some cases, you’ve probably been dying to say no anyway. Well, now you
have a really good reason: you’re building a business. You don’t have time to be
overextending yourself and saying yes to everybody. You have to make choices
about how you spend your time. Some of those choices will be hard, and some
will come as a relief as you make more time for what’s most important to you.
Some people think of this as a sacrifice, but I don’t like to think of it that way. I
just think of it as making choices. Some people are not willing to make those
choices. They see it as sacrificing time with their friends, and they’re not willing
to do that. But really, it’s a choice to work on their businesses. Ultimately, it’s an
investment. If you work on your business and keep building it, you can produce
some incredible results. If you give up too soon, you’ll miss out on all of those
things you could have.
As you make your choices, keep the long-term view in mind. Some people get
impatient and want to quit their full-time jobs immediately, but that wouldn’t
have worked for me. I had to build a foundation and a brand, and the more I did
that, the more clients I attracted and the more money I made. It’s worth taking
the time to do it right.
As you work through this book, you’ll start to see results. The more you work at
it, the more results you’ll see. Most business owners start to see a significant
return around the three-to five-year mark. At that point, you’ve been through a
launch before, so you know how to put your product or service out there so that
people will buy it. You start to build momentum. The money starts coming more
easily. Everything starts to flow.
This book will guide you through building the foundation that will see you
through those first few years and help you build success. The key is to treat your
business like a business, not a hobby. What’s the difference? With a hobby, you
work on your passion only when you feel inspired. Have you ever tried to write a
book that way? It never gets finished, because you don’t make time to work on it
when you don’t feel inspired.
When it’s your business, you have to work on it. Taking it seriously means that
you sit down at your desk and work on it, even when you don’t feel like it. And
in that way, you get it done. You end up having something to sell sooner rather
than later.
Motivation
To keep yourself going when things get tough, it’s important to remember why
you’re doing this. Why do you want a business? What would it mean for your
lifestyle and for your family? It’s important to answer that question for yourself
so you know what you’re working toward.
To get clear on this, I want you to close your eyes for a moment and imagine
what it will be like when your business is successful. I want you to fill in the rest
of this sentence:
When my business is successful, I will be able to _____________________.
What’s in that blank for you? When your business is successful, what will you
be able to do? I want you to write it down and get very clear on your vision of
